Market Overview for Technology for Aging in Place

You are here

CARE TECHNOLOGY SYSTEMS ANNOUNCES ACTIVE CAREPENDANT™

Wed, 09/25/2013 - 13:11 - Laurie Orlov

NASHVILLE, Tenn., (September 25, 2013) – Care Technology Systems, Inc., a company that provides data analytics and remote monitoring to improve the safety of seniors in their residences while empowering their caregivers, today announced the launch of a key new component in its next generation fall detection system.

The new Active CarePendant™ will enable caregivers to respond more quickly to a senior who has fallen. Equipped with a tri-axial accelerometer for accurate motion-sensing, the Active CarePendant detects if something is amiss and sends alerts even if the senior is unable to press the button to ask for help.

Beyond immediate notifications of falls, the new device is also designed to report motion activity over time, yielding data that can indicate trends that may occur before a fall. Proper identification of these trends will allow for timely interventions that can help the senior living industry provide proactive care and lower costs, while improving safety.

The new device will be offered both stand-alone and as a part of Care Tech’s signature QuietResponse™ monitoring system, which has been designed for home care and senior living providers to give constant attention to resident safety and staff efficiency.

"As they age, become more fragile or live alone, more seniors should wear pendants for their safety," said Jim Anderson, president of Care Technology Systems. "But even those who do, often can't respond when they fall. So providing both senior living communities and individual home-based seniors a device that could notify of any fall that occurs -- or predict a fall risk -- is a huge advantage to ensuring their care and well-being. This new pendant offers the precise level of technology needed."

One of the most critical factors for any pendant is compliance – whether the device is actually worn. The Active CarePendant is unique in reporting to caregivers when the pendant isn’t being used during non-sleeping hours.

Care Tech partnered with Cambridge, Mass.-based BioSensics, which develops wearable healthcare sensors, to produce the Active CarePendant™ . This next generation PERS device employs BioSensics' patented fall detection algorithms based on ten years of research supported by the National Institutes of Health (NIH). It also compliments the QuietResponse system, utilizing a process called Motion Scoring, to reveal life patterns that will predict falls and other behaviors.

The technology means significant healthcare cost savings to senior living centers, families of seniors and the healthcare industry, as recent statistics indicate hospitalization costs for falls average around $17,500. Statistics also show that one out of every three seniors will fall this year.

QuietResponse™ consists of sensors integrated into the background of the senior's daily life to document “normal” routines. When a condition is atypical, or signals a potential safety issue, notifications can be sent by text, email, page or phone, allowing caregivers to respond to the issue. The system uses a wireless hub that communicates with a cloud-based server; reports and statistics are generated for staff via a web interface. It's unique in both affordability and invisibility to the seniors who don't want to learn new technology or change their lives to add safety monitoring.

The new Active CarePendant™ and QuietResponse™ are available now and currently in use in a variety of situations including senior living communities and individual homes.

###

About Care Technology Systems (CTS)

Care Technology Systems creates solutions that passively gather data which enables seniors to live their lives more safely, but without encumbrance or intervention. The company's technology is seamlessly integrated into the senior’s lifestyle – no one must master new skills – and works quietly in the background, alerting caregivers so they can respond appropriately if there is an issue/threat to the senior’s health or safety. CTS’s aging-in-place system is a value-driven solution for individual seniors living on their own or with family, as well as for senior living and home health institutions. www.caretechsys.com